Looking around the dimly lit hall, Alice spotted a glass table. On top of it lay a tiny gold key.
"I wonder if this will unlock a door," Alice said as she picked up the key.
She tried the key in every door on both sides of the hall. It was too small, but Alice didn't give up. She tried again, and this time she discovered a small curtain.
"This wasn't here before," Alice said, pulling aside the curtain.
Behind it was a door about 15 inches high. And the tiny gold key fit perfectly!
Alice opened the door and knelt down. She peered through a small passage to a beautiful garden.
"Wow! That's the loveliest garden I've ever seen!" she said. "Look at those flowers and that fountain!"
Alice wanted to wander through the garden, but she was too big. She wished she could make herself small enough to fit through the door.
"I'm sure I could, if only I knew how to begin," she said.
So many strange things had already happened that nothing seemed impossible anymore. "There is no point in waiting by the little door," Alice thought. She headed back to the table.
"Maybe there will be another key or instructions for shrinking myself," Alice said.
Instead she found a bottle, which had definitely not been there before. Tied around its neck was a paper label. Drink Me, it said, in large, beautiful letters.
"I'm not going to drink some strange liquid!" Alice said. "That could be poison!"
Alice examined the label carefully, but there was no mention of poison. So she decided to take a sip.
"Mmm. That's delicious." Alice licked her lips. "It's like a mixture of cherry tart, pineapple, roast turkey, and buttered toast."
Alice liked the liquid so much that she soon finished the whole bottle. And then something strange began to happen.
"What an odd feeling." Alice looked around her. "I seem to be shrinking."
And indeed Alice was only ten inches high, but she was not upset. She was now the perfect size to fit through the little door. Alice was eager to enter the garden, but she waited a few minutes.
"I want to be sure I've finished shrinking," she said. "What if I keep shrinking until there's nothing left of me?"
Fortunately for Alice, that didn't happen. So she walked over to the little door, which had mysteriously closed again. Alice reached in her pocket for the key.
"Oh no! I left the key on the table!"
Alice raced back to the table. She could see the key quite clearly through the glass. But there was no way she could reach it. Trying to climb one of the glass legs, Alice slid back to the floor. The leg was so slippery! Still, she kept trying until she was exhausted.
Alice sat down and cried, but that only lasted for a minute. "Crying won't help you," Alice said to herself.
She wiped her eyes. Now there was a glass box under the table! Inside was a cake with the words Eat Me spelled out in raisins.
"If this cake makes me grow larger, I can reach the key," Alice said. "If I grow smaller, I can creep under the door. Either way I'll get into that garden."
Alice took a bite, and nothing happened. She was very disappointed because she now expected strange things to occur.
"This is a useless cake," Alice said. But she ate it all anyway.
And then she began to grow.